Most people, during their career, will change jobs and accumulate a number of different pension plans.  Having your pension plans in a number of different places may result in policies getting lost or forgotten about.  Small pension plans may prove to be less cost effective to manage.  And most importantly some pension plans may have different retirement ages with different rules.

It is important to ensure that you get the best out of the contributions you have made, and it is equally important that you keep track of your pension plans to make sure they remain appropriate to your personal circumstances.  Therefore, pension consolidation can be very advantageous.

Pension consolidation involves moving, where appropriate, a number of pension plans – potentially from many different pensions’ providers – into one single plan.  It is sometimes referred to as ‘pension switching.’

If you live overseas it may be possible to transfer your benefits to pension schemes outside of the UK.  A Qualifying Recognised Overseas Pension (QROPS) can be the pension plan that can accept all the UK pension plans into one.

The procedure for overseas pension consolidation has been simplified significantly since April 2006. Now, as long as the overseas scheme is recognised by HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) as an approved arrangement (known as a QROPS), the pension consolidation can be processed just like a transfer to a UK scheme.

The advantages of pension consolidation is that there will be only be one retirement date, one point of contact and one place from which benefits can be paid from.  Pension consolidation is beneficial in keeping track of your retirement benefits which will be a very important asset in retirement.

That said not all pension consolidation will be in your best interests, and there may be drawbacks to moving your pension plans – particularly so for certain types of pension.  Therefore, you should take careful consideration of all aspects of your existing pensions before making a decision as to whether or not to consolidate.

If you are unsure seek as to whether pension consolidation will be in your best interests, call us on +34 698 243 745 or Contact Us Today

Pension Consolidation QROPS Advice

GC QROPS has been successfully assisting UK expats in Spain with UK pension transfers for 9 years since 2006.

We are completely independent, and can advise on a wide variety of QROPS pension schemes – we are not tied to any single provider, which means that we will recommend the scheme which meets your exact requirements and needs.

(Image of Money pots credit to TaxRebate.org.uk)